Jammu-Kashmir polls: BJP releases third list of 29 candidates for 2nd and 3rd phases

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday released a third list of 29 candidates for the second and third phase of Jammu and Kashmir polls.

The party's latest list has 10 candidates for the second phase of polls and 19 for the third phase.

So far, the BJP has announced the names of 45 candidates in three lists.

The elections in Jammu and Kashmir will be held in three phases -- September 18, September 25 and October 1.

In the last assembly elections held in Jammu and Kashmir in 2014, when it was a full-fledged state, the BJP had won 25 seats.

Meanwhile, exuding confidence of the BJP forming the next government in Jammu and Kashmir, Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Tuesday said the pre-poll alliance between the Congress and National Conference for the upcoming assembly elections will have no bearing on his party.

Singh was in Doda district, which is part of his Udhampur parliamentary constituency, to accompany former minister Shakti Raj Parihar and Gajay Singh Rana who filed their nomination papers from the Doda-West and Doda assembly constituencies, respectively.

The Congress has announced a list of nine candidates who will contest in the upcoming Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections. The announcement came after Congress clinched a seat-sharing deal with ally National Conference (NC).

Earlier on Monday, the National Conference announced a list of 18 candidates who have been nominated as candidates from the party for the upcoming Assembly elections.

The National Conference will contest 51 of 90 seats and Congress 32, according to the seat-sharing pact reached by the two parties. The two parties will also have a "friendly contest" on five seats.

The two parties have left one seat each for CPI(M) and Panthers Party.

The BJP has so far not named its nominee for Nowshera, which was represented in 2014 by its current state president Ravinder Raina, and Gandhinagar, from where its another senior leader and former deputy chief minister Kavinder Gupta was elected in the last polls.